BLINDSIMMING LADY

Some years ago, after my maze blindsimming experience afore described, and at a time when I was becoming quite confident in my blindsimming expeditions, I expressed to Chris my odd desire to be blindfolded for a whole day, from when I got up in the morning until I went to bed at night, if not longer.

 

I have explained that I am married (happily, in all other respects) to a man who doesn't even know about my obsession with blindfolding. So it wasn't going to happen – I thought.

 

Chris, my brother and lifelong mentor in blindfolding matters, similarly with a wife, also unsympathetic to such matters, thought otherwise. As I have said from time to time, Chris is the sort who makes things happen!

He eventually proposed, that as we were both interested in bird sounds and outings to bird reservations, an interest that both our spouses thought boring, to say the least, we should both enrol for one of the courses held at RSPB centres, one that happened to be far from our home area and one that was held (as they almost all appeared to be), over a week-end. He thought, and I agreed, that our spouses might be glad to see the back of us for a day or two and, as we were brother and sister together, quite acceptable. I could then blindsim for the whole time and he would be happy – more than happy as I had come to realise - to have a blind partner to guide and entertain.

It turned out that we were correct and both spouses said that they were happy with such an arrangement.

After a while, we found just the thing. From a reception on the Friday evening to midday on the Sunday, a short conference on bird conservation matters at Sandwich, the far end of Kent from our Sussex home, over a hundred miles away but mostly reachable on motorways. We started planning in detail and were on the verge of booking the course, together with separate rooms (of course) in a Canterbury cheapish hotel, when disaster arrived.